Many advances have been made in the construction and utilization of composite materials for structural members. There is great interest in using such members in aircraft construction because of their great strength and light weight. However, a severe disadvantage is that prior to the present invention, such structures had to be fabricated individually for each airplane. In other words, each plane had to be constructed on a custom basis by hand since there was no automated process for making the composite structural members.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,512,837 to Sarh et al. discloses an apparatus for manufacturing a structural component, such as an aircraft wing, from a plurality of laminated fiber wound box frames made of fiber reinforced resin impregnated material.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,133,711 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,200,271, both to August et al., disclose a work table assembly for composite laminate fed from rolls to a mold with a transfer gantry, a taping gantry and a cutting gantry.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,816,102 to Cavin et al. discloses a method and apparatus for forming elongated composite parts having constant cross-sections which is shaped by passing the composite material, such as graphite fiber cloth through a protrusion die.
Although each of the foregoing patents disclose devices and processes which are satisfactory for their intended purposes, none discloses a method or apparatus for making a composite structural member on a continuous basis.